Last night, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill students pulled the statue of a Confederate soldier off of its pedestal. Hundreds of students celebrated in the McCorkle Place quadrangle which was the home of the statue, nicknamed "Silent Sam", since 1913. It was placed there by the racist United Daughters of The Confederacy, who busied themselves for the first half of the 20th century erecting statues to their treasonous forebears. The erection of Confederate statues after the Civil War was intended to intimidate and humiliate African-Americans during the Jim Crow era.
Statues memorializing the Confederacy's racist traitors have drawn increasing attention, as they've become a rallying symbol for alt-right white supremacists. The statue of Robert E. Lee in a Charolottesville, Virginia's Emancipation Park was the scene of numerous protests, culminating in the violent "Unite The Right" riot in August, 2017 where one counter-protester, Heather Heyer, was murdered by a white supremacist.
BONUS: Esquire's Charlie Pierce's take is worth the read.
(photo: Police surround toppled statue. Gerry Broome/AP)
